Taiwanese artists are set to light up France with music next year when they embark on a mission to promote Taiwanese music at Marche International du Disque et de l’Edition Musicale (MIDEM), a music trade fair in France that is billed as the world’s largest.
Pop diva A-Lin (黃麗玲), singer-songwriter Xiaoyu (小宇), pop-rock singer Shin (信) and the a cappella singing group O-Kai Singers (歐開合唱團) will perform their popular hits at a Taiwan Night concert in Paris on Jan. 30, GCA Entertainment Co said.
They are to perform at a similar concert at the music fair in Cannes on Feb. 1, the company said, which was commissioned by the Ministry of Culture to organize the concerts.
The Taiwan Night concerts are part of the government’s efforts to promote Taiwanese music at MIDEM, which attracts thousands of musicians, producers and managers each year.
Wang Hsi-chuan, co-producer of the O-Kai Singers’ award-winning debut album, said the group would prepare a program of a cappella music, traditional Aboriginal tunes and French folk songs.
The O-Kai Singers won the prestigious Contemporary A Cappella Recording Awards in the US earlier this year for their album O-Kai A Cappella.
Shin, known for his wide vocal range, said he hoped to interact with musicians from different countries in France and to arouse their interest in Taiwan.
“That is what we as musicians can do,” he said.
Chang Chung-jen (張崇仁), head of the ministry’s Bureau of Audiovisual and Music Industry Development, called MIDEM “the best venue” for introducing Taiwanese musicians to the world.
The organizer of MIDEM won the Taiwan-France Cultural Award this year, he said.
It is the 19th year for Taiwan to participate in the annual trade fair, which will take place from Feb. 1 to Feb. 4. In addition to setting up exhibition booths, the government has been sending Taiwanese entertainers to give live performances at the fair in recent years.
There are 77 incidents of Taiwanese travelers going missing in China between January last year and last month, the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) said. More than 40 remain unreachable, SEF Secretary-General Luo Wen-jia (羅文嘉) said on Friday. Most of the reachable people in the more than 30 other incidents were allegedly involved in fraud, while some had disappeared for personal reasons, Luo said. One of these people is Kuo Yu-hsuan (郭宇軒), a 22-year-old Taiwanese man from Kaohsiung who went missing while visiting China in August. China’s Taiwan Affairs Office last month said in a news statement that he was under investigation
An aviation jacket patch showing a Formosan black bear punching Winnie the Pooh has become popular overseas, including at an aviation festival held by the Japan Air Self-Defense Force at the Ashiya Airbase yesterday. The patch was designed last year by Taiwanese designer Hsu Fu-yu (徐福佑), who said that it was inspired by Taiwan’s countermeasures against frequent Chinese military aircraft incursions. The badge shows a Formosan black bear holding a Republic of China flag as it punches Winnie the Pooh — a reference to Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) — who is dressed in red and is holding a honey pot with
Celebrations marking Double Ten National Day are to begin in Taipei today before culminating in a fireworks display in Yunlin County on the night of Thursday next week. To start the celebrations, a concert is to be held at the Taipei Dome at 4pm today, featuring a lineup of award-winning singers, including Jody Chiang (江蕙), Samingad (紀曉君) and Huang Fei (黃妃), Taipei tourism bureau official Chueh Yu-ling (闕玉玲) told a news conference yesterday. School choirs, including the Pqwasan na Taoshan Choir and Hngzyang na Matui & Nahuy Children’s Choir, and the Ministry of National Defense Symphony Orchestra, flag presentation unit and choirs,
China is attempting to subsume Taiwanese culture under Chinese culture by promulgating legislation on preserving documents on ties between the Minnan region and Taiwan, a Taiwanese academic said yesterday. China on Tuesday enforced the Fujian Province Minnan and Taiwan Document Protection Act to counter Taiwanese cultural independence with historical evidence that would root out misleading claims, Chinese-language media outlet Straits Today reported yesterday. The act is “China’s first ad hoc local regulations in the cultural field that involve Taiwan and is a concrete step toward implementing the integrated development demonstration zone,” Fujian Provincial Archives deputy director Ma Jun-fan (馬俊凡) said. The documents